


Don't Ask About The Hat

by lurker_love



Category: Call of Duty, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare - Fandom
Genre: Except when he really really isn't, Gen, Gideon's in denial, Grumpy Gideon, Hair Kink, Hats, Kinda, M/M, Mitchell may or may not know what's going on with his CO, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-02
Updated: 2015-03-02
Packaged: 2018-03-15 23:23:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,094
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3465833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lurker_love/pseuds/lurker_love
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gideon reacts to Mitchell with longer hair, and Mitchell carefully does NOT ask about Gideon’s hat.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Ask About The Hat

**Author's Note:**

> I’m in the middle of my dissertation and am just taking whatever my muse throws at me, which is most certainly NOT what I was expecting. Roll on CoD AW, apparently. (I’m really, really not as grumpy about this as I’m projecting). 
> 
> This was meant to be a middle scene from a longer piece, but I’m kinda happy with the way it is. Who knows, maybe I’ll expand on it if my muse perks up when I’m procrastinating, I mean, playing the game again.

Mitchell, now that he wasn’t constrained by the regulation cropped cut of the Marines, had decided to let his hair grow.

Ilona noticed it first, the few millimetres of dark growth which softened the contours of his skull.

When she asked him about it, he only grimaced and palmed the back of his neck with his good hand, self-conscious but hiding it. He shrugged. “Figured it was time to try something new.” He said and scratched his fingernails through the lengthening bristles at his hairline.

Gideon considered himself a veteran of non-verbal communication. He was happy to talk and joke and curse when the moment was appropriate (and sometimes when it wasn’t, if he felt like a being a bastard and playing devil’s advocate or if the situation was FUBAR enough), but he never felt much of an urge to chat, or to fill silences. It was something he wasn’t afraid to use to his advantage; when he spoke, the men under his command tended to listen.

But this time, faced with a kid who already ticked so many of his carefully buried boxes, what he had meant as a non-committal hum emerged as a squeak of surprisingly high pitch from his suddenly dry throat.

It made him freeze where he was leant over the table, hands braced and head raised from the reports he had spread in front of him so that he could watch Mitchell enter their common room.

Mitchell, who had obviously heard and was now looking at him, frozen in the doorway and mouth open a little in surprise.

Gideon cleared his throat and scowled, stubbornly keeping his hands from clenching and relaxing his posture. He wasn’t a boy, he wasn’t a rookie; no one was reading anything from his body language if he didn’t want them to. He’d managed this long, damn it. A pair of pretty eyes and biceps weren’t going to change that.

Not even the way Mitchell was quietly trying to push through the loss of his best friend and that of his left arm (Gideon was British, he could appreciate quiet strength when he saw it).

And yes, a carefully-honed hero complex was almost mandatory in his line of work, and had the added potency of speaking to a particular part of Gideon’s hind-brain which made him want to roll over and beg. But _Goddammit_. He was self-aware and cynical enough to know that this was not something he was willing to put out in the open.

Gideon cleared his throat again, straightened and snagged the plastic bottle of water from beside his paperwork, taking a long drink and willing down the blush he could feel climbing his neck.

“Well,” he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand when he’d got a handle on his reaction, “if it looks like shit, I’m not lending you any of my hats.”

(It wouldn’t look shit - it really, really wouldn’t).

Mitchell’s brow furrowed a little, and his eyes flicked up to contemplate the hat Gideon had pulled on this morning after waking up with too many aches and deciding he didn’t want to see the grey in his hair today.

“You have more than one?”

Gideon frowned, lifting the hand not holding his bottle to run over his hat, mirroring Mitchell’s suppressed self-consciousness from a few moments before.

Sure, his hat was old, and a little worse for wear, but no more so than the two other identical ones he owned.

Ilona, reclining on the sofa with a battered paperback, shot Gideon a look and sniggered. “You do not mention the hats, Mitchell. He is not happy when someone mentions the hats.”

“Leave my fuckin’ hats out of it.” Gideon growled, lowering his hand and crossing his arms, water bottle gripped in a fist. He widened his stance without thinking.

Mitchell shot Ilona a quick quirk of a grin, a surprisingly roguish curl at the side of his mouth and a flash of teeth, before looking back to Gideon. His expression eased until no obvious smile remained, but Gideon watched him through narrowed eyes as he walked forwards to stand on the opposite side of the table, eyes down to glance curiously at the spread of paperwork.

Gideon could sense the amusement still radiating from the man and he braced himself for the usual questions, the ones Mitchell was too new to know not to ask. Why did Gideon wear the hats? Didn’t he know that they were hardly protective? Going bald, old man?

Mitchell leant a hip against the table and slipped one hand into a back pocket. “Thanks, but you keep them,” he said easily, still not looking up from the reports, “they look better on you anyway.”

Gideon swallowed the surprised sound lodged in his throat, both eyebrows ticking up disbelievingly.

Mitchell reached out with his free hand and snagged one of the pages on the table with his fingertips, rotating it until he could read it. At this point, Gideon was 90 percent sure the man was using it as a prop for his dramatic pause. Who knew the kid could be such a theatrical shit when it suited him?

“Besides…” Mitchell continued and Gideon almost growled. That was, until the kid raised his eyes and held Gideon’s gaze. “If it gets that bad, you can always just give me a haircut.”

Mitchell indicated the combat knife Gideon always had tucked inside his boot, another curl at the side of his mouth. Not a full smile, but more impactful because of it – Gideon couldn’t read it, damn him, didn’t see if it was mocking, inviting, self-deprecating … and it made him angry.

The water bottle crinkled in Gideon’s grip and some of the anger must have bled through into his scowl.

Because, for fucks sake, there was no way in hell he was going to be the one to cut Mitchell’s hair short again if it looked as good as Gideon imagined it would, grown longer and softer and fringe falling over those eyes.

In fact, he imagined he’d have to keep a very tight leash on himself if anyone else even mentioned it where he could hear.

He knew - knew right then and there, with Mitchell watching him warily, hip still propped against the table and sleeves pushed up far enough to deliberately expose the join between what was left of his arm and his ridiculously advanced prosthetic - that surviving this kid, this man, would be a sore test. Of his patience, his command, and his control.

_Fuck me_ , he thought.

 


End file.
